Saving Seafood

Blockages gone, fish back in post-Sandy projects in Mass., 5 other states

November 26, 2018 — Billions of dollars have been spent on the recovery from Superstorm Sandy to help people get their lives back together, but a little-noticed portion of that effort is quietly helping another population along the shoreline: fish that need to migrate from coastal rivers out to the sea and back.

After the 2012 storm, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service spent nearly $11 million on a series of projects to remove dams and other blockages from coastal waters in six states, partnering with local environmental groups. Fish species that were scarce or entirely absent from those waterways for years soon began showing up again.

The so-called “aquatic connectivity” projects in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Maryland and Virginia were part of a $105 million effort not only to fix what was damaged by Sandy, but also to improve environmental conditions in places where recreational benefits could help tourism and the economy, as well. While the storm did its worst damage in New York and New Jersey, its effects were felt in many states along the East Coast.

“The idea was not only to do good things for fish and wildlife, but to provide community benefits and make communities more resilient,” said Rick Bennett, a scientist with the Fish and Wildlife Service in Massachusetts. “By removing dams, you also reduce flooding, especially upstream.”

Aquatic species benefiting from the work include the Eastern Brook trout, sea run brown trout, sea lamprey, American eel and river herring.

One of the first and most successful projects happened in Spring Lake, New Jersey’s Wreck Pond. For years, the conflicting goals of protecting the environment and some of the New Jersey shore’s priciest real estate from storms have bedeviled the pond.

Storms sometimes open a channel between the 48-acre tidal pond and the ocean, but governments keep sealing it shut to protect homes from flooding. The result was poor water quality and much narrower access to the ocean, which hurts fish that travel from ocean to pond to breed.

The American Littoral Society oversaw construction of a concrete culvert between the pond and the ocean to make it easier for fish, including herring, to reach the sea. In addition to letting fish in and out more easily, the culvert can be opened or closed as needed during storms to control flooding.

It succeeded at both goals, said Tim Dillingham, the group’s executive director.

“The restoration of connectivity to allow fish to return and spawn has been a great success,” he said. “We’re seeing fish come back in numbers we hadn’t seen before. And it has also added to the resiliency of the area during storms, by adding capacity to deal with flooding.”

Read the full story from the Associated Press at Boston.com

Illegal shark finning probe nets criminal charges against ten international fishermen

November 12, 2018 — HONOLULU — Federal investigators have charged ten fishermen with trying to smuggle nearly a thousand shark fins out of Hawaii.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said they are all Indonesian nationals and worked on the Kyoshin Maru, a longline fishing vessel from southern Japan.

“They have no clue what they were doing here. All they could tell me was ‘ikan,’ which means fish in Indonesian,” said Gary Singh, an attorney for one of the fishermen.

This comes eight years after Hawaii became the first state to ban possession of shark fins. The following year, the federal government strengthened its existing ban and the trade largely went underground near Hawaiian waters.

Read the full story at Hawaii News Now

US refuses entry of invasive Chinese crab

November 2, 2018 — The United States government refused entry of hundreds of pounds of invasive Chinese mitten crabs in Cincinnati, Ohio, U.S.A., earlier this month.

While conducting a routine inspection of incoming Chinese freight at a local express consignment facility, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agricultural specialists noted x-ray anomalies in 16 shipments, which were labeled as clothing.

They discovered thousands of live Chinese mitten crabs, destined for residences in New York.

Read the full article at Seafood Source

HAWAII: NOAA ship evacuates biologists from Papahanaumokuakea ahead of Hurricane Walaka

October 5, 2018 — The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s research ship Hi‘ialakai has taken seven NOAA field biologists away from French Frigate Shoals ahead of Hurricane Walaka, which is approaching Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument today.

The field crew of three green sea turtle biologists and four monk seal biologists was not scheduled to leave French Frigate Shoals until mid-October, said Megan Nagel, spokeswoman for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service — Pacific Region.

Instead, Nagel said in an email, they were “recovered ahead of their scheduled mid-October departure date by the NOAA ship Hi‘ialakai.”

On Monday, a U.S. Coast Guard crew flew a HC-130 Hercules from Air Station Barbers Point to Johnston Atoll and evacuated four U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biology field workers from the wildlife refuge.

Hurricane Walaka was a Category 4 storm with sustained winds of 130 mph when it passed the tiny four-island atoll Tuesday.

Read the full story at The Star Advertiser

DAVID BERNHARDT: At Interior, we’re ready to bring the Endangered Species Act up to date

August 13, 2018 — A modern vision of conservation is one that uses federalism, public-private partnerships and market-based solutions to achieve sound stewardship. These approaches, combined with sensible regulations and the best available science, will achieve the greatest good in the longest term.

Last month, the Trump administration took this approach to bringing our government’s implementation of the Endangered Species Act into the 21st century. We asked ourselves how we can enhance conservation of our most imperiled wildlife while delivering good government for our citizens. We found room for improvement in the administration of the act.

When Congress created the Endangered Species Act, it built a tiered classification for our most at-risk wildlife, designing different protections for “endangered” and “threatened” species. The act was designed to give endangered species the most stringent protections while affording federal agencies the authority to tailor special rules for lower-risk, threatened species on a case-by-case basis.

It may surprise most Americans, however, that the highest level of protection is often applied, regardless of the classification, through application of a “blanket rule.” The use of this rule by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service automatically elevates protections for threatened species to the same level as those given to endangered species.

But automatically treating the threatened species as endangered places unnecessary regulatory burden on our citizens without additional benefit to the species. The blanket rule reflexively prohibits known habitat management practices, such as selective forest thinning and water management, that might ultimately benefit a threatened species.

Read the full opinion piece at The Washington Post

DELAWARE: Fish and Wildlife Service to support watershed conservation efforts

August 8, 2018 –The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation announced on Aug. 7 the launch of the Delaware Watershed Conservation Fund, a competitive grant and technical assistance program of $4.3 million that will provide new support for the protection, restoration and conservation of fish and wildlife habitats in the Delaware River Watershed, which provides drinking water for more than 15 million people.

Congress provided funds to the FWS in fiscal 2018 to leverage public and private funding to support the environmental and economic health of the Delaware River Watershed for boots-on-the-ground conservation projects — as outlined in the Delaware River Basin Restoration Partnership and Program Framework.

Covering 13,539 square miles of land and water, the Delaware River Watershed is home to native brook trout, red knots, river herring, freshwater mussels, oysters and other wildlife. Headwaters and streams located in rural, forested and agricultural areas play a major role in the ecosystem, as do urban and suburban waterways such as those in Trenton, Philadelphia and Wilmington.

Work supported by the DWCF will take place in a variety of landscapes and habitats across the Delaware River Watershed, from the beaches and tidal salt marshes of the Delaware Bay to the farms, cities and towns of Delaware, Pennsylvania and New Jersey, to the cold-water rivers and streams of New York. The DWCF will expand and further facilitate restoration and conservation efforts in the basin to restore and conserve fish and wildlife habitat; improve and maintain water quality for fish, wildlife and people; manage water volume and improve flood damage mitigation for fish and wildlife habitat; and improve recreational opportunities consistent with ecological needs

Read the full story at the Smyrna-Clayton Sun-Times

Whose Fish Is It? Who’s in Charge Here?

August 6, 2018 — Restaurant owners may know that open-faced sandwiches are regulated by the federal Food and Drug Administration (FDA), part of the Department of Health and Human Services. But if a second piece of bread is added on top, it is regulated by the Department of Agriculture (USDA). That’s because the USDA has a very specific definition of a sandwich: two slices of bread with the meat in the middle. So, is a hot dog a sandwich? The National Hot Dog and Sausage Council says no, but the State of California says yes. How about a burrito? Massachusetts ruled that a burrito is not a sandwich, but New York says it is. A cheese pizza is regulated by the FDA, but add pepperoni and it becomes a USDA matter. When you make an omelet, FDA regulates the eggs you crack, but if you pour liquid eggs from a carton, it’s USDA.

Regulations can be confusing, sometimes because of vague wording, but often because of overlapping jurisdictions. It is not always obvious who is in charge. Clean water rules are under the jurisdiction of the EPA, but projects that might affect stream water require permits from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. A salmon or sturgeon swimming in the ocean is under the jurisdiction of the National Marine Fisheries Service, part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Department of Commerce. But if the same fish swims upstream into a river, it becomes province of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, part of the Interior Department.

Pundits have made fun of such regulatory silliness for years. Hillary Clinton joked about the sandwich rules when running for the Senate 18 years ago. At least two presidents have cited the weird pizza rules, yet nobody did anything about the regulatory mess.

Read the full story at The American Spectator

Feds allow pipeline construction in North Carolina to expand

July 26, 2018 — Federal regulators are allowing work on the 600-mile Atlantic Coast Pipeline to expand in North Carolina.

Federal Energy Regulatory Commission officials this week approved work to proceed without further steps to protect endangered species. The FERC order issued Tuesday said work could be stopped to protect the environment if ordered by a federal court.

Opponents are trying to force a stop to the $6 billion project after a federal appeals court in Virginia in May vacated a U.S. Fish and Wildlife service approval meant to protect threatened or endangered species.

The pipeline being developed by Dominion Energy, Duke Energy and Southern Company will carry fracked natural gas from West Virginia through Virginia to North Carolina.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at WVVA

CHARISE JOHNSON: The newly endangered species of the Trump era is the Endangered Species Act

July 24, 2018 — The Endangered Species Act itself is currently endangered, as a result of predation by lobbyists, conservatives in Congress and President Donald Trump.

Last week, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Marine Fisheries Service announced proposed revisions that would change the way the agencies implement the Endangered Species Act – actions that could lead to the destruction of essential habitat and otherwise preventable species extinctions. And President Trump’s allies in Congress are preparing their own additional attacks on the law, pushing bills in both the House and the Senate that would demolish the scientific foundations of the law.

Speaking to the New York Times, Richard Pombo – a former member of Congress notorious for his hostility to environmental laws who is now paid to lobby for mining interests – says that the Trump administration and Congress are offering “probably the best chance that we have had in 25 years to actually make any substantial changes” in the law.

Read the full opinion piece at NBC News

Trump Administration Proposes Revamping the Endangered Species Act

July 23, 2018 — A decades-old environmental law credited with saving the American bald eagle from extinction would be reworked under a proposal the Trump administration announced Thursday.

Enforcement of the Endangered Species Act, which seeks to prevent plans and animals from becoming extinct, would be changed to make it is easier to remove species from the list of protected ones. The proposal also makes changes that speed the approval process that federal agencies are required to complete before making changes that could harm endangered species, and would weaken protections for critical habitat.

“We are proposing these improvements to produce the best conservation results for the species while reducing the regulatory burden on the American people,” U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Principal Deputy Director Greg Sheehan, said in a statement. “One thing we heard over and over again was that ESA implementation was not consistent and often times very confusing to navigate.”

The effort underscores the ways the Trump administration is moving to change bedrock environmental laws in a manner long sought by industry. Last month the administration began the process of overhauling the National Environmental Policy Act which requires environmental reviews on projects ranging from oil fields to highways that require a federal permit. The Environmental Protection Agency, meanwhile, has used industry guidance documents and policy memos to dial back its oversight of air pollution under the Clean Air Act.

Read the full story from Bloomberg at Yahoo! Finance